


sitting in the embers

by roboticdisposition



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: :(, Confessions, Flirting, Fluff, George POV, Internal Conflicts, Longing, M/M, Sort Of, blame that, that fucking hoodie pic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-13 22:00:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29408742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roboticdisposition/pseuds/roboticdisposition
Summary: “You look really small in that jumper,” Dream laughs, but his voice is soft and it makes George feel funny in his lungs, like he can’t quite catch his breath. He’s standing on his bed, arms wide, jumper loose, hanging over his hips and his hands, because Dream is stupid and he’s sent him an extra-large.-Or, Dream sends him some merch and George overthinks everything.-Or, George burns and they are both a little stupid.
Relationships: Clay | Dream/GeorgeNotFound (Video Blogging RPF)
Comments: 11
Kudos: 199





	sitting in the embers

“You look really small in that jumper,” Dream laughs, but his voice is soft and it makes George feel funny in his lungs, like he can’t quite catch his breath. He’s standing on his bed, arms wide, jumper loose, hanging over his hips and his hands, because Dream is stupid and he’s sent him an extra-large.

“Fuck off,” George whines, stepping forward to climb off the bed. He tries to roll up his sleeves but they keep falling back down. It’s a hopeless endeavour. “I don’t know why you felt the need to mock me like this.” He laughs and flaps his sleeves. He can hear Dream’s laugh echo through his headphones. “Like - like you knew this wasn’t gonna work.”

“Come on, George,” Dream huffs through a wheeze, “It’ll be cosy.” George sighs, sitting back down at his desk, Dream isn’t exactly wrong, but he still thinks it’s stupid.  _ Dream _ is stupid. “And you look cute in it - small, for sure, but, cute as well, I suppose.”

George stops, looks over at the Discord call, at his reflection and his flushed cheeks. He’s never been good at pretending, especially when it comes to Dream. Maybe he’s stupid as well. Maybe they’re both stupid. “Shut up,” He says, and he can almost see Dream’s smile through his headphones.

“No,” Dream says, voice gentle now that he’s stopped laughing. “I meant it-”

“Fuck off,” George interrupts, but Dream cuts him off again.

“It’s like you’re wearing one of my jumpers.”

George laughs, trying to diffuse, stop the bleeding, but he’s shit at pretending and his cheeks are crimson in his webcam. He should have just sent pictures, he should’ve never turned on his video. “It’s not  _ your _ jumper, Dream,” He’s mumbling now. He turns away, trying to hide his cheeks as he turns to his curtains. It’s early, the sun’s rising, he hasn’t yet gone to sleep. He probably should.

“I know,” Dream tells him like a secret. George’s chest starts to burn, wildfires in his lungs, little forests burning as he tries to breathe. “I only wear a large though, so… so my hoodies wouldn’t be that big on you.”

George can taste the embers on his tongue, hot and dark and sticky. He’s not very good at pretending, so he lets the words wash over him and feels them like sparks in his veins. George thinks he’s not very good at pretending, but he should’ve learned a long time ago. “You’re still stupidly tall though.”

“Yeah,” Dream agrees, and George hears him shuffling around. He wishes he could see Dream too, although he supposes then it makes it a bit closer to reality from illusion. He’s not very good at pretending, but he’d be even worse if he could see Dream looking back at him, like it’s just the other side of the window pane, close enough to touch, but not close enough to be real. He’d quite like to see if he blushes too, when he says things like this, or if it’s just George who’s affected. He’s curious, that’s all. He could always ask but… but he thinks that would only make it worse.

“At least yours wouldn’t drown me like this one,” George says, poking the flames. He feels the embers, he sees the ashes, the coal, but he likes the heat, he likes the way his stomach burns. He rolls up his sleeves again and Dream hums lightly; there’s a moment of comfortable silence, and George thinks about Dream, about his hoodies, whether he’d lend him one if he were in America, if he were close enough to touch, or if it’s all bravado, computer screens, modified reality and it’s not quite real.

“Yeah, you’d still look small though,” Dream says through a smile. George can hear it, he knows him well enough. It’s a chain reaction, because then he’s smiling, and he’s turning back to the Discord and looking at Dream’s stupid green profile picture and… and he’s wondering how he got here, in this mess. “You’d… you’d smell like me too.”

George breathes in, it’s not quite far enough, there’s this thick layer of tension like smoke over the phone line, and George can’t quite gather his wits to blow it away just yet. He looks down at his keyboard and he tries to understand: it’s just Dream spouting stupid shit, it’s not like that’s an infrequent occurrence, but there’s something in his voice that’s a little softer, a little more open, and it’s making everything feel tender, almost fragile.

“Like… my cologne, I mean,” Dream carries on in the face of George’s silence. He’s never been one to back down. “And my washing powder.”

“Yeah,” George finally breathes, he feels his cheeks like movie screens, screening his emotions like he’s never kept a secret in his life. It’s stupid. He wishes he was better at pretending. “That sounds nice,” He says, in the end, because the sun’s rising, and there’s a slither of orange peeking through his curtains. He’s tired, and he’s shit at pretending.

“Does it?” Dream asks like he’s holding his breath. It’s stupid, George thinks,  _ Dream _ is stupid.

“Yeah,” George says again, curling his fingers into the sleeves of the hoodie. He’s feeling a little gentle. He’s feeling like the forest has burned and now he’s left with the remains, and now he has to deal with it. “You know that.”

“I mean…” Dream takes a breath, “Not entirely… I - I don’t know sometimes, what’s just joking and what’s…” He trails off. George thinks it’d be nice to see him, know whether he’s looking down at his lap, avoiding George’s reflection, if he’s smiling, if his eyebrows are furrowed, if he looks like he’s still hazy from sleep or if he’s had a shower. He blames curiosity, but he’s not good at pretending.

“I know,” George whispers, like it’s a sin, like a confessional. “I… I’m the same, especially on stream sometimes.”

“I know,” Dream repeats, “I think - I think if you want honesty, I like to tease you, you’re cute when you’re flustered, and others maybe I mean it. Do you… do you think there’s a middle ground to that?”

“If you want one there can be,” George holds his breath. It’s not like they talk about it, what they are, what they mean. There was a conversation one night, a month or two ago, that George likes to think of as the culprit, where Dream had come back from a night out with Sapnap, tipsy, on the edge of drunk, and George hadn’t slept yet, hazy in the sunrise, and Dream had said ‘I think there’s something between friendship and romance’. And it’s not like it was ground breaking, discussing what they both already knew, yet hadn’t acknowledged. It acted as a trigger for George, some kind of acceptance, that he’s allowed to think about it, that he doesn’t need to feel guilty for it, that there’s not miscommunication entirely from the start.

He feels a similar weightlessness now, where his chest is tight and his fists clenched, and they’re on a fine line between being implicit and being unaware. George thinks it's like the line between friendship and romance, they’re dancing between, hazy and waiting for someone to dare. George thinks they rely on these middle grounds. Dream’s just mentioned the tension between teasing and meaning and… it feels so similar to the path they've walked before. They’re dipping their feet in the water, but they’re not taking the step in. It’s balance and it’s… it’s stupid. George thinks it’s all a bit stupid.

“Yeah,” Dream eventually mumbles, “I think so.” And George has already forgotten the point. He’s listening to Dream’s breathing, soft huffs through his headphones. He wonders if that makes him obsessive. “I… Can you come visit me soon?” Dream adds, quiet in the rising sun. George can see the crimson flames on his cheeks in the reflection of his webcam.

“I’d… I’d like that.” George whispers, gentle, a little fragile. He’s burning up, lungs filled with smoke, liminal in the waking moments before he sleeps. “Maybe you can give me one of your jumpers properly then.”

He can hear Dream smiling when he says “I’d like that too.” And George is terrible at pretending, but he doesn’t want to this time, because in his fingertips, under the stupidly long sleeves of Dream’s hoodie, he feels something warm, something that feels like everything. “I meant it when you said you were cute, you know,” Dream adds after a moment, voice rich like molten gold.

“Fuck off.” He shakes his head, blushing. “You’re cuter, you fucking idiot.” Dream only laughs, all warm, and George thinks he could get used to this. He’d quite like to, actually.


End file.
